Microsoft reportedly interviews Mark Hurd for CEO role

SOFTWARE HOUSE Microsoft reportedly has started interviewing potential candidates to take over from Steve Ballmer as CEO of the company, including Ford CEO Alan Mulally and Oracle co-president Mark Hurd.

According to the newspaper's sources, Mulally and Hurd are among eight potential candiates contacted by Microsoft, with Nokia CEO Stephen Elop and "at least two" internal Microsoft executives also in the running. According to previous rumours, Microsoft investors were urging the firm to consider Computer Sciences Corporation CEO Mike Lawrie for the job, too.

Some of these candidates apparently will be approached as early as next week, with Microsoft reportedly having already started interviews.

It's unclear who has the best chance of taking the Microsoft CEO job from Ballmer, with Ladbrokes seemingly having suspended betting. However, the last we looked, Nokia CEO Stephen Elop was the front runner, with the betting website offering 2/5 odds on the Finnish phone firm chief taking over the reigns at Microsoft.

At that time in early September, Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg was also tipped for the job, with Ladbrokes offering odds of 7/1. Microsoft's Steve Sinofsky was at 12/1, while Kevin Turner, presently Microsoft COO and former CIO at WalMart was at 16/1.

Microsoft's board reportedly wants to have settled on a new CEO by the end of 2013. µ